Perspectives From Peking

Out of the Frying Pan...

When seasoned journalist Abdiel LeRoy joins China Central Television in Beijing, it is his second foray into Chinese state media. Surely, things can only get better after his ordeal at China Radio International, right?

But now, Xi Jinping is installed as China's leader, and the authoritarian screws are tightening again. Nor has incompetence relaxed its chokehold of China's cultural discourse. The author is about to find out the fraudulent depths to which managers will go to persecute quality in a workplace wedded to mediocrity.

Yet amid the darkness, there is light, as Abdiel again takes to the Beijing stage to play the lead role in a British comedy.

With a journalist's eye and lively wit, LeRoy witnesses the early days of China's reversion to its most repressive instincts now playing out against Hong Kong and the Uighurs of Xinjiang. But he also frames these observations in context of China's psychological and historical traumas.

Perspectives From Peking is the final memoir of five in Abdiel's Dueling the Dragon series. As always, he'll have you laughing between the tears!

"An adventure, a memoir, and certainly one of the more entertaining books about China before us today."

San Francisco Review of Books

"These stories from China are addictive!"

"LeRoy's ability to write so cogently about such AWFUL things and simultaneously give readers a chuckle, is magnificent."

"Wields a wicked and eloquent pen."

"Should be awarded an honorary degree in Anthropology."

"Informative and eye opening."

"Reveals the the dark side of the country."

"The author knows the Chinese better than the Chinese."

"Subverts dominant concepts of China."

Reader reviews